Mental Health: Light Regimen for Pregnancy Depression
Published: November 28, 2000
For some pregnant women, depression does not always wait to be postpartum. Depression can come at any point in a woman's pregnancy, and if it does, she and her doctor can be in a quandary over whether to try antidepressants.
Now researchers believe they may have found a way to help these women without exposing them and their fetuses to drugs. Turning to a technique sometimes used to help people with seasonal affective disorder, the gloom that can settle in as fall comes and the days grow shorter, the doctors have been trying light therapy on their patients.
The preliminary results are promising, said the researchers, who are engaged in a cooperative study involving Yale, Columbia and Case Western.
Participants in the study are given portable light boxes and asked to sit in front of them for one hour daily. The light is believed to help increase levels of serotonin, the mood-regulating hormone, in the brain. Studies of most antidepressants have not shown them to harm fetuses, the researchers said. But the drugs can cause unpleasant side effects, making light therapy more attractive, if it is proved effective. And, taking drugs known to affect the central nervous system during a time when a fetus's brain is developing may also be of concern, the researchers said.